Building Our Bridges
by wintersayshi
Summary: Grace Parker hadn't seen her father Greg in years. Grace and her twin brother Dean had been estranged from their father for years. But after coming to Toronto briefly see their father, Grace is touched by her father's efforts to reconnect with the two of them and willing to take a chance Grace and Dean eventually decide to move back home to try and be a family once again.
1. Chapter 1

_Dear Gracie,_

_How are you sweetheart? I miss you. I miss you and your brother every single day Grace and the two of you are never far from my thoughts. I know you may find that hard to believe as the memories you have of me are barely existent as I was always preoccupied with work to be the proper father and husband I should have been. I also know that if I wasn't working then I was drinking. I was so caught up in all my problems that I lost sight of what was the most important to me; my family. For that I am sorry Grace, I am terribly so sorry as I should have never exposed you and your brother to that. The two of you and your mom deserved better than that. I hope you and Dean are doing well and not driving your mom crazy by arguing. I can only imagine what the two of you get up to these days but I imagine you still have a love of reading. I remember having to build you shelves because we all used to constantly trip over your books whenever anyone took a step into your room. I still have your copy of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, hopefully someday I'll be able to return it to you. I understand perfectly if you don't want to respond to this letter Grace, just know that I am here for you if you ever need me._

_Love always. _

_Dad._

* * *

Grace looked at the letter in her hand, over the years her father had sent countless to and her brother Dean but neither of them ever read. The letters were all returned unopened except for this one. It was one of the first letters that Grace had received after her mom had moved them away from Toronto to Dallas. For some reason Grace had decided to keep the letter, she had snuck it past her mother and hidden it in her memory box away from prying eyes and most of her all brother. Dean would lose his mind if he knew that Grace had kept one of their father's letters. Grace had had this letter for about eight years but she had never opened it until after her father Greg had turned up on their doorsteps several weeks ago. It had been eight years since Grace and Dean had last seen their father and their memories of him weren't the best for a reason. Their father had been a workaholic and an alcoholic who had no time for him family, Greg Parker had practically pushed his family out the door. Their mother Melissa had moved them out of Canada to get Grace and Dean away from Greg and since then they had minimal contact with their father until he showed on their door. Greg had claimed her was different but it had kind of fell a bit on deaf ears and the whole thing didn't end well. But it didn't stop Greg from trying, which is what brought Grace and Dean to Toronto to seek him out.

"You ready?"

Stuffing the letter back into her bag Grace glanced at her twin brother Dean and forced a smile at her face as she turned her attention back on to the building they were about to enter. It was the headquarters of the strategic response unit where their father work and they figured that they would find him here considering one of the few things they knew about their father was that he was a workaholic. Grace could feel butterflies in the pit of her stomach as she glanced at her brother. Dean had been the one who had wanted to do this and Grace had just tagged along out of sheer curiosity. Grace could barely remember anything about her father and she was a tiny bit interested. Not to mention there was no way in hell she was going to let her brother do this without her. "Yeah, I'm ready Dean…"

"There's no need to be scared Gracie." Dean assured and Grace narrowed at her brother, her brown her eyes meeting her brother's identical brown eyes.

"I'm not scared Dean, I'm slightly apprehensive about this whole thing. There is a _difference _I'll have you know. I'm pretty sure you were the one who was freaking out about this thing more than I was." Grace corrected which caused her brother to scoff and she felt slightly better, a little less nervous about the entire thing and so after taking a deep breath Grace took a step forward. The first step seemed to be the hardest but after that Grace found her feet walking on their own accord, matching the pace of her brother's as they entered the building and followed the signs and got into the elevator which took them upto the SRU.

The SRU looked very high tech and fancy and as soon as she stepped out with Dean, Grace could hear the quiet murmuring of voices, which were mostly male. Grace could feel her stomach tighten as now she was really nervous and she made a point of sticking very close to Dean as she felt small and exposed in this huge place. It was rather daunting to Grace so she shuffled quietly along with Dean over to the front desk where a woman was clearly on the phone speaking on a handset until she noticed the two teenagers who were anxiously waiting.

"Hi, can I help you? The woman asked with a small smile and Grace looked over at Dean as she was pretty sure that of she opened her mouth, nothing was going to come out. The nerves were very overwhelming and coupled with Grace's innate shyness, it meant that she wasn't going to be able to get a word out yet.

"Uh... Yeah." Dean began and Grace could hear the nerves as clear as day in her brother's voice, sure she had been teasing him about it a few minutes ago but this was a very big and scary thing for them to do. Especially Dean who was taking point on this one. "We're here to see Greg Parker."

"Sure, can I tell him who it is?"

"Yeah… Um, it's Dean and Grace Parker." Dean announced sounding a bit more confident but Grace could still here the nerves in her brother's voice.

"We're his kids." Grace quietly nodded and the woman nodded her head at them with a small smile and Grace noticed that her eyes darted across to something next towards the left of them. Grace turned her head and saw their father was already standing there, clearly surprised to see the two of them there and Grace tugged on the sleeve of her brother's jacket to get his attention and eventually she got it and Dean turned to their father as well. He had less hair then Grace had remembered and he looked a bit older, then there was the uniform.

"Hey…" Greg quietly said almost whispering and Grace could see her father's eyes darting from her and Dean, practically taking in every possible detail of them that he could. Almost as if he was imaging the two of them being here. The shock was still clear on his face and Grace wasn't sure what to do or even what to say. She had only tagged along with Dean for moral support as there was no way she could do what they had come to do, she didn't have the courage to do it. Hence why Dean was going to be the one to break the news to their father. "Hey."

"Uh, hey." Dean replied and Grace just awkwardly looked around as it seemed like none of them seemed to be able to pull a full sentence together and get it out. All any of them seemed to do was babble in rather awkward manner which was kind of avoidable given their estranged relationship.

"What are you both doing here? I mean, it's good to… I just didn't know that the two of you were coming down. It's good to see you both here and together." Greg said, eventually managing to get a somewhat complete sentence out and Grace forced herself to smile. Then the last thing that Grace was expecting to happen, actually happened. Her father reached out towards them and pulled the two of them into a hug. It was weird, there was no doubt about it as for Grace it was like a random stranger was hugging her despite the fact that she knew that this man was no stranger, her was hers and Dean's father. Grace couldn't remember the last time she had received a hug from her father but regardless it still felt oddly familiar despite the awkward atmosphere. As the hug went on Grace could make out her father's breathing, him trying to keep a hold on his emotions as her and Dean's sudden appearance had clearly knocked him for six. When their father finally let go of them, he didn't move away much. Looking them over and resting his hands on their shoulders momentarily, overwhelmed by the sight of the two of them together. Grace just wanted to flee there and then but she found her feet stuck to the ground. It wasn't the whole fight or flight situation, she just froze.

"W-We're visiting Shelby, our aunt…" Grace chocked out and she watched as her father nodded at then both.

"I know who Shelby is, but why didn't you tell me?" Greg asked which caused Grace and Dean to simultaneously look at each other, they didn't say anything to each other. They didn't need to as their eyes did all the talking for each other.

"We… We didn't want to call first, I thought I might back out and Grace just tagged alone with me." Dean stated and Grace just looked at their father, he didn't seem like the man she remembered. Greg seemed _different_, he seemed much more soft spoken and not in a constant bitter and tired mood like he used to be whenever he came. There was definitely something different about him, the same kind of difference that Grace picked up on in the sole letter of his that she had kept all these years. Maybe Greg Parker had changed after all these years.

"Does your mom know you're here?" Greg asked.

"No, she… She thinks that we're at the movies." Grace sheepishly admitted as she played with the ends of her French plait, carefully avoiding her father's gaze in case he decided to scold them for lying to their mother and sneaking off to see him when they all knew she wouldn't be happy if she knew where they were. Then there was the fact that Greg was also a cop.

"She doesn't know that you're both here…" Greg slowly said and Grace shifted around rather uncomfortably as she felt really bad about this know, right from the start she knew that this was a very bad idea. But there was nothing that she could do now as they were here.

"Do you think there's someplace we could go and talk?" Dean questioned and Greg nodded in an enthusiastic manner.

"Yeah! Yeah, c'mon." Greg stated with a smile as he led Grace and Dean past the front desk and an open space gym like area before the three of them entered a large conference room. Greg took a seat and motioned for Grace and Dean to take a seat but only Dean sat down. Grace awkwardly stood a meter away from her brother an anxiously looked around, her nerves were really getting to her now. Grace's stomach felt uneasy like it was going all topsy turvey. "Grace, you don't want to sit?"

"She can't sit. Grace can't keep still when she's nervous." Dean explained.

"I remember." Greg noted offering Grace a small smile which she couldn't return but she was struck by her father's kind nature, it was something that she hadn't seen in a very long time. For the last few years Grace had this perception of her father as this uncaring monster who was so wrapped up in himself and had no care for his family. But the man in front of her who was smiling? Seemed like a shadow of that man, a much more kinder person than what Grace could remember.

"Um… I… Look, this is hard too say but I have to say it… I really appreciate that you want to be back in touch but, it just won't work out. Grace and I have a family that we love and we were going along just fine. Now everybody has gotten upset since you filed that suit." Dean slowly explained his voice crackling every so slightly and Grace looked down at her shoes as if they were the most interesting things in the world. "Look… We're sixteen years old and I don't want to be forced to have another father and I love him. We love him and I'm planning on taking his last name so I'm here asking you to drop the lawsuit. Please."

"Grace, is this want you want too?" Greg asked.

"I-I…" Grace stammered a she felt her face starting to burn up a sure sigh that she was blushing, It tended to happen when got embarrassed or flustered and now was a prime moment as she got flustered when she was put on the spot. This was what she wanted to avoid, this moment. Their father was hurt, it was clear in his eyes that he was crushed by the news. Grace wanted to be sick. Before Grace could respond to her father or be sick she was interrupted by the woman at the front desk calling out something before a loud alarm went off and her father rose from his seat and took off towards the door of the meeting room they were in.

"Winnie?" Greg called out.

"Shots fired in progress." Winnie replied and Grace looked up to see her father staring at her and Dean in a rather sheepish manner. She figured this was what their mom meant about their dad always having to take off because of his job. It was kind of the worst timing but what could Grace do about it? There was no point in complaining about it as it was already happening.

"I'm sorry, I've got to do this." Greg apologetically began.

"Yeah right. Of course you do, come on Gracie." Dean started as he rose from his seat and began to walk past their father and Grace slowly followed behind him. She didn't want to leave. Grace knew it wasn't thier dad's fault that he had to leave, he had a job and it wasn't like he could just take off an leave especially if gun shots had just gone off. Whilst most people's jobs weren't to respond to gunshots, Grace knew that it was her father's job to respond to them as after all he was a cop.

"No no, just wait here for me…" Greg pleaded as he kept up with the two of them and then moved so he was standing right in front of them. From the way he was looking at them as he pleaded for them to stay, Grace felt the tiniest of ache's in her heart. Their father wanted them to stay, he wanted to stay and be able to talk to them but he couldn't he had to go. Grace knew that Greg wasn't telling them to stay but rather he was asking them to stay, hoping that they would.

"We should really go."

"Please." Greg asked again with the same softly spoke tone of voice.

"All right." Grace answered before Dean could even say no to the idea, she wanted to stay and she knew that Dean wouldn't leave without her. So he was sticking around regardless of whether he wanted to or not.

"The movie's over in an hour." Dean added.

"All right, thanks." Greg replied with a small sort of relieved smile and Grace felt slightly better as her father turned to the female officer who was sitting at the front des. "Winnie?"

"I'll watch them."

"Feed me on the fly." Greg stated as he gave Grace a reassuring pat on the shoulder before taking off leaving her in front of Dean who clearly wanted an explanation.

"He deserves more than that. C'mon Dean, the least we could so is stick around until he gets back so we can all have a proper conversation about what just happened. We can't just turn up and have you drop the news on him and just leave. Greg's our dad and he's been making an effort so the least we can do is make a tiny effort with him on this." Grace quietly said, finally able to string a full sentence together without stammering once since her and Dean had stepped into the SRU.

"C'mon pull up a bench and hang with me." Winnie invited with welcoming smile and Grace accepted the invitation and began to walk over to the front desk to join Winnie with a reluctant Dean trailing behind her. And so the waiting began.


	2. Chapter 2

They had waited. Much longer than they had originally agreed on or anticipated but it was kind of hard to leave when they were overhearing what was going on which made Grace glad that her and Dean had stuck around the SRU. Sitting with Winnie and listening to her father working with his team trying to save that little girl was the most nerve wracking and yet adrenaline experience that Grace had ever been through. Hearing those gunshots and not knowing who had shot them and if anyone had been hurt or even worse killed was pretty daunting. Grace didn't have the most active imagination in the world but her imagination had been kind of running wild as she tried to picture what was going on outside whilst her and Dean were inside with Winnie. Grace had always know that her father had been a cop, she had known that for as long as she could remember but she hadn't know the know the extent of the job. Winnie had explained that as Sergeant, her father was overall leader of Team One and he was the primarily negotiator on the team. As Grace listened to her father work, she started to understand what Winnie had told her as it seemed like her father had a skill for reading people and talking to them. It was a far cry from the angry alcoholic that Grace used to know, the man who had practically pushed his family out of the door and to another country to get away from him. This version of Greg Parker was kinder, warmer and somebody who Grace didn't quite recognize. Grace knew that her father hadn't always been the man who she remember, it was just a result of him feeling the need to constantly work and his alcoholism. Before all that came he was a loving husband and father, then everything changed and Grace no longer recognized her father. The same thing could be said about the Greg Parker that Grace was currently looking at now, sure he looked and sounded the same as always. But she knew didn't know him, she hadn't in a long time and yet he seemed so familiar but not similar as in the angry workaholic and alcoholic father that Grace could remember. Rather the father that Grace used to know, a very long time ago.

"You haven't lost your job or anything like that? Have you because of what happened today?" Grace wearily asked as she smacked away Dean's hand as he tried to steal a piece of the salad. Winnie had explained to Grace and Dean that their father had used lethal force to save the little girl his team had been looking for and as such he had to talk with the Special Investigations Unit about the shooting, straight after it had happened which is why he had taken so long to back. When their father had finally came back to the SRU he had been surprised to see them both still there and they had offered to take them out for pizza. Dean had other ideas and suggested that he would cook for them and so the three of them were back at his apartment.

"No. I just had to have a debrief with Special Investigations about the shooting and explain that Alexis' life was in imminent danger and whilst the SRU is tasked to resolve extreme situations without the use of deadly force, sometimes we do have to use it if there is no solution." Greg replied in a reassuring manner. "I'll have to attend the coroner's inquest in a while but I haven't lost my job, the SIU have to investigate but they will conclude that the use of lethal force was justified."

"I'm glad… Well not that you had to kill someone but I'm glad that the little girl is okay and safe now. I can't imagine what it's been like for her, going on the run because some guy wants to kill because she witnessed a crime. All this time she should have been outside playing with friends instead of running and hiding." Grace quietly stated as she eyed up her father briefly, for someone who had shot someone dead only hours ago he seemed to calm about it. But Grace rationalized that this might not have been the first time and it wasn't like Greg had killed the man in cold blood. He was a cop and had made a judgment call which had saved the life of a ten year old girl.

"At least Alexis and her family won't have to run anymore." Dean added.

"I'm sorry that you guys had to sit around the barn for so long, it's just that Team One were on call and e had to respond. At the time I didn't know how long it would take or that I would end up with SIU." Greg attempted to explain and Grace just waved his apology off or rather began to until she noticed that she had a knife in the hand that she was waving about so she promptly put said hand back down.

"It's fine. You know your job is your job and it's not the kind of job where you can get someone to cover for you on the last second. You had to go and because you did, you saved that girl's life. Plus it was petty cool sitting with Winnie and listening to what was happening…" Grace said with a small smile.

"You wasn't saying that a couple of hours ago Gracie, you nerves were so fraud that at one point you were wound up tighter than a spring." Dean pointed out and Grace just glared at him.

"It's called reacting like a normal person Dean so forgive me for getting a bit tense when I hear several gunshots over a radio." Grace retorted as she stuck her tongue out at her brother and Dean quickly stuck his tongue out and moments later she heard laughing coming from right in front of her and she turned to see her father laughing at the both of them.

"It's just nice to see you both together, I remember when the two of you were really young that you'd be playing with each other one moment and then fighting the next. It was always over some toy that you'd both want and you'd fight over it for longest time before forgetting what you were fighting over and go back to playing with each other like nothing had happened." Greg explained and Grace looked at Dean and moments later they both started to laugh, the two of them almost fought. It was just atypical brother and sister thing and the arguments they had were always petty and never seemed to last for more than a few hours.

"We still argue quite a bit and mom tells us off about it saying that we shouldn't be like that towards each other because of the whole twins thing. But the arguing thing is inevitably considering how much time we spend with each so the arguing tends to happen because we press each others buttons frequently. But whilst Gracie tends to drive me crazy, I like having her around." Dean admitted with a shy and nervous smile and Grace noted the proud yet sad smile that was on their father's face. No doubt he felt bad about not being around these last eight years. "Sentimental idiot." Grace quipped with a small smirk before she gently nudged her brother.

"Now go wash up for dinner, I'll be nice and dish everything up since I cooked most of it as you can barely boil pasta."

"Very funny Grace." Dean sneered in an amused manner before walking off in the direction of the bathroom, leaving Grace alone with their father and as Grace began to start dishing up the food her eyes couldn't help but keep wondering over to her father's. She was trying to figure him out but it was kind of hard to, probably due to the fact that he spent most of his days reading people. It was rather annoying.

"Grace whatever it is you want to say or ask me, go ahead… I know you might feel uneasy given how long it's been since we've last seen each other but I want you to know that you can say anything to me. No matter what it is." Greg stated and Grace opened her mouth in shock at first as she had no idea how her father knew that. Until she remembered that this was part of her dad's job and clearly he had picked something up off of her.

"Am I that obvious?" Grace wearily questioned with a weak smile

"Yeah I'm afraid so." Greg replied as he pointed to Grace's hand which she kept switching from fidgeting with to being bunched up with a fist. Grace couldn't help but frown, she hated the fact that she had such a tell tell sign for when she was nervous about something. People could tell from a mile off when something was wrong with her, Dean especially as he knew when something was bothering Grace before she started displaying the whole nervous twitch she had going on.

"You seem different. Well from what I can remember and even then that's not much to begin with as I've purposely tried not to remember when we used to live here. I don't really know as the psychobabble is more your thing then it is mine but you just seem different from the man who I've had in my head. I see someone different, someone much more soft spoken, calm and gentler than I can previously remember." Grace quietly said.

"Is it a good thing? Me being different." Greg hesitantly asked and Grace slowly nodded her head. "Yeah I think so. I kind of had a cross between the boogeyman and one of those rigid cops in my head over the last few years in my head. I'm not really sure why but that doesn't seem to be you. I look at you and I see something different from what I'm been convincing myself of these last few years. My memory may be a bit hazy over what went on all those years ago but I know enough that things weren't good. That you were different back then and it was bad enough that mom left with Dean and I because of the person you were then, because of the alcohol and everything else you had going on." Grace quietly admitted in a rather awkward manner.

"I did a lot of things back then that I regret now Grace, everyday I have regretted what I did to hurt you, your mom and Dean because you were the most important people in my life and I hurt you all. The people I love the most and it took losing you three for me to take a long hard look in the mirror. I know I can only say this to you and may not mean much but I'm not the man I was back then. I have changed, I don't drink anymore." Greg said and Grace looked into her father's eyes searching for any sign of deceit but she couldn't see anyone. But that didn't mean that she instantly believed him or that they could start playing happy families again but Greg was clearly making an effort with both her and Dean. Taking a deep breath Grace walked over to her bag and pulled out the crumpled letter than she had stuffed back into her bag earlier and handed it over to Greg. "What is this?"

"I've kept this. It's the only letter that you sent that I kept and I only opened it after you came down to Dallas to try and see us. It's why I came with Dean today, I wanted to see if you truly were sorry about what happened like your letters made you out to be and I think you are. Or I want to think you are but you have to show me that you really are sorry, that you want to be a dad again as letters can only do so much…"


	3. Chapter 3

Stifling a yawn Grace opened her bedroom door and slowly trailed in, dropping her gym kit and her school bag to the floor before collapsing on to her bed. It had been an extremely long day at school followed by track practice and all Grace wanted to do was sleep for hours on end. But she had two chapters of bio to read along with studying for a test tomorrow in world history. There was so much for Grace to do and so little time especially when she just wanted lie down and sleep for a while. However Grace knew if she fell asleep know then she would wake up a few hours later and unable to get to sleep later on. Grace allowed herself to lay on her bed for a few minutes before finally willing herself to get up off her bed and drag herself over to her bookshelf. Grace scanned the bookshelf browsing through the dozens of books in her possessions until she came across the one book that she was looking for. _Alice's Adventures in Wonderland_. It was one of Grace's all time favourite books but the aged hardcover book in her hand was very special. It had belonged to Grace when she was a little girl and her dad used to read it to her on those rare days that he was home in time for her bed time story. Grace had accidently left it when her mother had moved them and Dean out of the family home. The book had been returned to Grace when her and Dean went to their father's house for dinner just under two weeks ago. Their father had handed back to Grace and she was glad to have it back, it reminded her of the few good times that she could remember of her father back in those days.

As Grace opened the book and idly went through the pages, taking in the beautiful and slightly aged illustrations when her bedroom door flung open and in walked Dean much to Grace's annoyance. If there was one thing that drove Grace crazy about her brother, it was the fact that he had no sense of privacy and constantly barged into her room without batting an eyelid, or even knocking.

"About time you got home!"

"Please, come in without knocking…" Grace sarcastically stated as Dean sat himself down on her desk chair but Dean didn't seem to pick up on the sarcasm, but if he did he just chose to ignore it.

"What took you so long? I thought you would be back about half an hour ago?" Dean questioned as Grace took her book and sat herself back down on to her bed and settled herself into a comfortable sitting position.

"Who are you? My mother instead of my brother? Whatever… Practice overran slightly because coach wanted to have a team talk that seemed to have never end and then Annie and I grabbed a smoothie on our way home. It's thirsty walk running round a sports track constantly. But what's so important that you're acting all weird about me coming home slightly later than usual? What did you do this time brother?" Grace questioned.

"Why do you naturally assume that I've always done something wrong sister?" Dean retorted and Grace couldn't help but laugh.

"Because I'm your sister, so what's up Dean?"

"I've been thinking a lot about dad recently, about how he's not the same person that we remember. I believe him when he said to us that he changed a lot since we were kids and we last saw him." Dean slowly began and Grace nodded her head in agreement, after they had dinner with their dad and returned back to Dallas, the two of them had been talking a lot about their dad. The man they had followed on the radio as he worked in the field with his team and the man who they sat down and had dinner with hours later, was a far cry from the Greg Parker that both Grace and Dean used to know as their dad. This Greg was different, a lot calmer and most importantly he didn't drink. When they went back to his place for dinner, Grace took a chance to look around the apartment and in the fridge and from what she could see there was no alcohol in the slightest. That of course wasn't definitive proof that their father was no longer drinking but the lack of alcohol and the water their father drank over dinner was something Grace took as a good sigh. Their dad really seemed to be turning his life around which was nice. "I'm thinking about going up to Toronto to see dad again, actually I've already booked the ticket to go. I leave next Friday and I'm going up for the weekend."

"Next weekend, huh? When did you decided this?" Grace questioned and Dean took a sharp intake of breath before scratching the back of his head.

"About twenty minutes ago Gracie, I was waiting for you but you were taking so long that I went ahead without you." Dean admitted and Grace had to admit that she was surprised by this as her brother was the rational one. Dean was the cool and collected one out of the two of them who used more logic hence why he wanted to become a lawyer.

"Is that so, huh? Dad must have made a real impression on you as when we saw him you were ready to tell him to leave us alone and stop with this visitation battle so we could take Sid's last name. Look at you now Dean, booking plane tickets on the spur of the moment to go visit dad. I have to admit that I'm very impressed big brother of mine." Grace quipped in amusement, which caused Dean to bashfully smile.

"So what do you say Gracie? I reckon that we can book your ticket now and we'll probably get you a seat next to mine and don't worry about dad. I've already spoken to him, well I sent him a text asking if we could come up to see him next weakened and he said of course. Dad's really looking forward to seeing us again." Dean replied and Grace had to admit that she was very touched that her dad was excited about seeing the two of them again. Since she had been back home Grace had been worrying about how he dad had been coping all these years by himself, all alone without his wife or children. It was quite sad but Grace was glad that her dad had managed to not let that allow him to sink further down into a spiral of depression and alcoholism.

"I can't Dean, I have my track meet next Saturday." Grace slowly announced, it pained her to say this but Grace couldn't skip out on this meet as she was in with a good chance of breaking the school record for the 800m with the times she had been putting in over the last few months. As much as Grace wanted to go back to Toronto with Dean to see their dad, she had made a commitment to this track meet and she had to see it through.

"Oh…"

"But go ahead without me, just because I have to go to my track meet it doesn't mean that you and Dad can't do the whole male bonding thing without your dorky little sister hanging around. I hear bonding between a father and son is very important."

"You are not a dork Grace."

"That's funny Dean because I can distantly recall you calling me a dork this morning and to hurry myself up as we we're going to be late if I wasn't careful." Grace couldn't help but point out and Dean rolled his eyes.

"You know what I mean by that." Dean replied. "Are you sure your okay with me going up to see dad all by myself? If you want I can cancel my ticket and we can reschedule when you're free. I don't mind waiting Grace…"

"No I'm sure, I think it would be good for you and dad to spend some time together without you having to keep one eye out on me in order to tell me to stop pacing or playing with my hands. So go and have fun with dad, spend some quality time with each other and enjoy yourselves. You've already told dad that we're coming and I don't want to disappoint him by saying both of us aren't coming. I'll send him an email explaining my track meet and I'll tell him that I'll come up with you again at a later time and maybe go up to Toronto to see him by myself one weekend. So don't worry about me Dean, I'll be fine without you for a couple of days." Grace assured her brother with a reassuring smile.

"If your sure Gracie."

"Whilst we're speaking of dad, we should probably talk about mom about this as well…" Grace slowly began, bringing up the subject that her and Dean had kind of been avoiding ever since they had gone to see their dad. They had lied to their mother about going to the movies when they had gone to see their dad and they hadn't told her the truth since. Both Grace and Dean knew that their father was a pretty sore subject with their mother for obvious reasons. There had been a reason why the two of them had mentioned that they were meeting their father as not to upset her. But Grace knew that if they were going to continue to visit their father up in Toronto then they needed to tell their mother the truth.

"Are you sure about this Grace?" Dean questioned and Grace slowly nodded her head, their mother was going to be pissed off and upset to say the least. But Grace loved and respected her mother enough to know that she deserved the truth from children and not have them lie to her about something like this.

"We can't keep doing this Dean, we can't keep sneaking off to Toronto to go meet dad behind mom's back. There is no way you can tell her that your going to visit Aunt Shelby as mom will check in expecting you to be with her. It's not fair for us to be sneaking around and lying to mom about all of this, she deserves the truth from us. After everything mom has done for us over the years, to make us happy and make sure we grew safe and happy we have to be honest with her Dean. No matter how hard it will be, regardless of mad she will be. We owe it to her Dean, mom has always been honest with us so the least we could do is be honest with her about all of this."

"Okay, so we'll tell mom." Dean replied and Grace smiled as the two of them were agreed on telling their mother the truth, it was going to be hard and their mom could potentially ground them for this. But regardless it was the right thing for them to do.

"Tell mom what?"

At the sound of that voice, Grace felt her blood froze. At first Grace thought that she had been hearing things but judging by the look on Dean's face, clearly she wasn't hearing things. Looking away from Dean, Grace looked up to see their mother standing in the doorway of her room with a not too pleased look on her face. Grace hadn't even heard her mother coming up the stairs and yet she was here and Grace had no idea how much of the conversation that her mother had heard but whatever she had heard Laura Naylor wasn't too pleased about it. Grace looked back over Dean, this wasn't good at all.


	4. Chapter 4

Grace awkwardly switched between looking at Dean to looking at their mother, this wasn't exactly how she thought her and Dean would tell their mom that they were back in contact with their father again. Grace hadn't even heard her mother come up the stairs, let alone opening her bedroom but yet here Joanne Naylor was here waiting expectedly for her children to tell her what was going on. Her and Dean had just been discussing telling their mother and that was as far as they had gotten, as their mother had walked in just before they could begin to discuss when and how they were going to their mother who was now waiting expectedly for her children to tell her what was going on. Grace knew that they couldn't lie, there was no way the two of them could come up with something that would match up with what the other one was thinking and their mom would bust them straight away. Grace sheepishly fidgeted on her bed as her mom was not going to like what she was about to hear, it was going to destroy her and now Grace felt even more guilty about what her and Dean had been doing. Their mother had been protecting them every single say of their lives, she had made the hard decision to leave her alcoholic husband and take their two children with her. Since that day Joanne Naylor had done everything she could to protect her children.

"Mom, can you take a seat please? We want to talk to you about something…" Grace wearily began, motioning for her mother to come in and join them, more specifically sit down. As Grace knew that her mother needed to be sitting down when she received this news as she wasn't going to take it well in the slightest. Grace watched as her mother's blue eyes darted from between her and Dean, eyeing them both up suspiciously before she took a seat on Grace's bed.

"Is someone pregnant? Grace are you pregnant? Dean have you got some girl pregnant because I thought that I had made it clear when I had the 'talk' with each of you, that neither of you were to make me a grandmother before each of you had finished college, had a job and were preferably in a stable relationship or married." Joanne began and that was the last thing that Grace was expecting her mother to say and apparently Dean felt the same way given that his jaw was hanging halfway down to the ground.

"God no mom!" Dean spluttered.

"Expulsion?"

"I think our school would call you to inform you mom of mine or Dean's explosion if we we're the kind of kids who got kicked out of school. But I promise you mom that no one is pregnant, or been arrested, expelled or developed some kind of addiction in the slightest. The two of us are the happy and healthy twins that you have been raising for the last sixteen years. I promise you mom that neither of us are in any trouble in the slightest so your mind can rest easy. There is no need for bail money or any kind of interventions, at least not yet anyway." Grace told her mother with a reassuring smile.

"Then what is going on? Because I come up here to ask what you two wanted for dinner as it's just going to be the three of us as Sid is going to be late and I hear the two of you talking about being honest with me and telling me the truth. So forgive me for assuming the worst when I find my two children acting very suspicious, now what's going on?" Joanne asked and Grace couldn't help but swallow a lump in her throat as she had no idea how to even begin to tell her mother this news, so she looked at Dean. It took her brother a few moments to realize that Grace wanted him to start things off.

"Mom, do you remember when we to visit Aunt Shelby in Toronto and Grace and I went and caught a movie? We said to you that we would only be a couple of hours but we come back to Aunt Shelby's a lot later than we said we would. We told you that we caught another movie, then grabbed a bite to eat and just walked around the city for a while, familiarising ourselves with all the places that we used to go back when we still lived here." Dean began and Grace watched as their mother slowly nodded her head. "Well me lied mom, we didn't catch any movies or did any of the stuff that we told you and Aunt Shelby that we did. Instead we went to the headquarters of the strategic response unit."

"Why would the two of you go something like that? Why did the two of you lie to me about what you were doing in Toronto?" Joanne questioned and Grace pursed her lips together for a brief moment before sighing.

"We lied because we went to go see dad." Grace announced and at first she thought that her mother hadn't heard her but then it became increasingly clear that she had. It was like Grace could see the wheels turning in her mother's head, as she tried to grapple with what she had just been told. Then the hurt became as clear as day in her eyes and Grace felt so bad. She never wanted for things to end up this way, Grace nor Dean never wanted to hurt their mother and yet here they were.

"You saw your father?" Joanne asked, her voice having risen a few octaves as she rose from Grace's bed and started walking around the room with her hand covering her mouth.

"Yes." Grace quietly replied.

"Why?" Joanne demanded.

"After dad filed that suit for visitation rights, everything went to hell and I could see what it was doing to you and Sid. After everything we had gone through I didn't want dad to force his way back into our lives and have the court make Grace and I spend time with him. I decided to go see him and ask him to drop the suit because we were happy the way things were without him in our lives and Grace came with me. We thought we'd see dad and tell him to back off but we ended up staying a lot longer than we expected because dad and his team got called out. We waited until he come back, the three of us went back to his place for some dinner and we talked–" Dean attempted to explain.

"You talked with him? You talked to that man?" Joanne asked and Grace could see that her mother was not taking the news well.

"Yes." Grace replied and moments later their mother stormed out of the room and based on the sound of the footsteps, it was safe to assume that their mother had retreated back to her bedroom.

"That went well." Dean dismally noted and Grace sighed in response as she got up from her bed as this wasn't over in the slightest. Their mother needed to know the full truth and Grace was going to tell her mother everything else as she deserved to know. Grace knew that her and Dean couldn't carry on re-establishing a relationship with their father behind their mother's back. It wasn't fair on her given everything their mother had done for them.

"Let me talk to her, give me a few minutes." Grace quietly said as she left her bedroom and walked down the hallway to her mother's bedroom. Standing outside the door, Grace took a deep breath and knocked on the door and after a moment of waiting she walked inside without being invited in, Grace found her mother standing by one of her bedroom widow, idly staring out in the distance. "Mom, I know that you are upset with Dean and I about this and you have every right to be. We know that we shouldn't have lied to you about this situation with dad but we didn't imagine things turning out like this. We just went to tell him to drop the suit and things went from there mom, we sat and listened to him as he worked. We had to stay at the SRU but we listened as dad worked with their team, they saved the life of a little girl who was being hunted down because she was a witness to a crime. Dad helped save her life."

"Forgive me for not being bowled by you informing me that your father is still a workaholic who puts his work before his children yet again. Grace you and your brother were too young to really remember what your father was like–" Joanne began.

"I know mom, I know that you had to put up with a lot of crap from dad and he wasn't a good guy back then. My memories of him are pretty vague and I know you will hard to believe for obvious reasons but he is different mom. Dad is not the guy he used to be back then. He knows he did a lot of wrong things, that he pushed us away and wasn't a good husband or father then and he's really remorseful about pushing us away. I know that it may not mean a lot to you as you had to put up with a lot more than we did, that you protected us from dad but he is not the same man anymore. Dad doesn't drink anymore, he's been sober for years now. He's calmer, softer… I can't really explain it but you can see it. He's trying to make amends mom, he really is trying." Grace said in a soft tone of voice as she tried to step gently around her because talking about her dad was a real stressor for her mom, for obvious reasons.

"Give me your phone." Joanne said after a moment.

"E-Excuse me mom?"

"I am assuming that you and your brother are in touch with your father and I, which means you must have his number in order to contact him. So I want you to call him as I would like to speak to him." Joanne clarified in a prickly tone of voice which left Grace feeling rather uneasily but her mother's tone of voice suggested that she shouldn't argue with her in the slightest so Grace didn't. Instead Grace pulled out her phone and went through her contact list until she reached her father's number and she hit dial. The phone rang for a few moments before it was finally picked up on the other side.

"Hey Gracie, how are you sweetheart? Is everything okay?" Greg asked in the warm and cheerful tone that Grace was fast associating with her father.

"U-Um… I'm good dad, I'm sorry to call you whilst you're at work but Dean and I were talking to mom about you and how we saw you when we came to visit Aunt Shelby. Now mom wants to speak to you as…" Grace sheepishly said as she glanced over at her mother.

"Ah…" Greg replied, no doubt figuring out what had happened and what was coming next for him. Grace was glad that she wasn't currently in her father's shoes at the moment as he was no doubt about to go through a tense conversation with his ex wife.

"Yeah, sorry dad." Grace quietly replied before handing the phone over to her mom before she quickly left the room. Grace knew it was best that she wasn't in the room whilst her parents spoke as things were always a bit tense. However Grace knew her dad could hold himself as he was a trained in negotiation and he dealt with worst people than his angry ex-wife on a daily basis. Grace figured it was best that she headed back to her room where Dean was still in there, no doubt waiting.

"What happened?" Dean questioned as Grace sat dramatically sat back down on her bed and she wasn't sure how to begin to explain what had happened with their mother but Dean quickly picked up on it. "That bad, huh?"

"Mom made me call him, the two of them are on the phone right now and I would probably stay out of her way for a while and I wouldn't tell her right now that you are going up to see dad next weekend…"


End file.
